1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to monitoring devices and systems, and more particularly to monitoring devices and systems for community custodial monitoring and remote surveillance.
2. Description of the Related Art
The present invention relates to monitoring devices and in particular to monitoring devices useful in the home attest field and related remote monitoring applications. Most prior art home-community electronic arrest systems have developed around the use of radio frequency transmission signals. Such devices and systems are used to essentially track and verify the location of a person to which the device is attached. The majority of such devices and systems are interlinked with a central monitoring station that either tracks the monitored person directly with radio signal telemetry or, a remote communicator is placed in the monitored persons home that is interfaced with the telephone system that signals the central station when the person is at home. Usually a curfew period is set whereby the monitored person is not permitted to leave the confines of his house, and any attempt to do so sets off an alarm in the communicator and the central station is notified via the telephone lines.
Typically such monitoring devices are provided as wrist or leg devices which are placed on the monitored person by riveting or other mechanical fastening means to insure permanent placement, and any attempt to remove or tamper with the unit will set off a tamper frequency, that is, some form of signal transmitted to a remote monitor. Additionally, such devices typically have a strap that is made of a polymer plastic that contains conductors which if cut or pulled apart set off a tamper frequency. Inside the strap are conductors that create a circuit loop that if severed trigger anti-tamper transmission frequencies thereby alerting the authorities.
It is also common, in prior devices, to provide a case that contains the radio transmission circuitry on the wrist or leg device which is activated if the case is either opened or destroyed. When activated, a tamper or alarm frequency is initiated, and if the transmission ceases all together, the remote communicator sends a romper or an alarm status signal to the central monitoring station via the telephone lines. Central monitoring station staff personnel then notify the appropriate authorities of the violation of the monitored person.
Another genre of prior home monitoring devices utilize radio transmitting devices with remote communicators without transmitting a signal to a distant location to monitor the location or condition of the device. Rather such devices utilize a telephone call back system where a computer dialing system calls the monitored persons home, the phone rings and the person answers, hangs up, and inserts a wrist or leg device into the communicator. The communicator then sends a verification signal back to the central monitoring station. If there is no response when the central station calls, the monitored person is in violation and such status is recorded by the central station computer. Such wrist and leg devices typically transmit a low level radio frequency that transmits in response to the call back cue.
All such prior monitoring devices suffer significant problems which have limited their applicability and usefulness. For example, all such prior devices constantly transmit a radio signal which requires a constant supply of power. All such prior art home attest devices and systems therefore have used and required a battery power supply, and since batteries only maintain a peak performance level for a short period of time before the power curve drops and fluctuates, significant errors and inefficiencies occur. Since such radio transmission devices require a significant amount of power to perform efficiently and accurately, such limitations greatly limit the usefulness of prior devices and systems. Moreover, when battery power drops, false tamper or alarm signals are sometimes activated. Additionally, if the monitored person walks near a washing machine or any other device which generates a magnetic field, the transmission signal of such devices gives off a tamper status frequency, and in some cases ceases transmission all together.
Such prior devices and systems are further limited by the ease of creating counterfeit signals, such as created using garage door transmitters, which fool the remote communicator into verifying the monitored persons presence at a particular location, when in fact, the person is elsewhere. Such limitations, coupled with the false tamper signals previously discussed, create a logistical and custodial nightmare in the management of such devices and systems.
Accordingly, it is the primary object of this invention to provide an improved monitoring device for use in home arrest, monitoring, identification, and security applications which is extremely reliable, efficient, tamper-proof, easy to monitor, and inexpensive to manufacture and apply.
Additional objects and advantages of the invention will be set forth in the description which follows, and in part will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The objects and advantages of the invention may be realized and obtained by means of the instrumentalities and combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims.